My Big Nose and Other Natural Disasters (3 page)

Two nights later, we sat in the nosebleed seats at Lawlor Events Center watching the Reno High graduation on the jumbo screen, along with a bunch of giggling underclassmen girls and third-cousin-once-removed-type relatives who couldn't score the good seats.

"Ahh, he's so sweet," Hannah cooed as Dave Richards walked across the stage to accept his diploma.

"Need I remind you? Valentine's Day? Vomiting incident?" Megan said. "He's got drinking issues."

Dave reminded me of my first big die-when-I-saw-him-in-the-halls crush—Zane Zimmerman. I went to every basketball game freshman and sophomore years just so I could watch Zane run around in his baggy shorts, his blond hair flopping over one eye. Afterward, I'd beg Hannah and Megan to stick around so I could hear him say, "Hey, Jory." We waited all year for him to ask us to a party. Never happened. Finally, Valentine's Day sophomore year, we skipped out on the school dance (none of us had been asked) and headed up—slightly uninvited—to a party at Dave Richards's house. When we arrived, Zane said, "Hey," patted my head like a puppy's, and continued to spend the night playing a drinking game with a bunch of seniors. Near curfew, Dave Richards hurled all over Megan's shoes. Thus, the Valentine's vomiting incident.

"I still miss those suede clogs," Megan said as wild applause broke out when Dave high-fived the principal. She rolled her eyes. "
So
mature."

"But he's always so nice to
me
now." Hannah giggled.

"Because he thinks he ruined
your
shoes," Megan said.

"I know. It's so cute how he's got us all mixed up." Hannah sighed. "Remember how he asked me on a shopping date? But I was seeing that guy from yoga."

Ever since she'd ditched the back brace, Hannah has had to use two hands and one foot to count her boyfriends. My hands
and
feet could get amputated in a terrible car accident (not my fault, someone else's) and I'd still be able to count my boyfriends.

"I'm so invisible." Megan shook her glossy hair around her shoulders.

Not true. Plenty of guys noticed Megan, but she intimidated them. The good grades. The good looks. The not-so-good attitude. Last summer, Megan got her braces off, begged her mom to pay for contact lenses, grew four inches, and then developed "major issues with the pathetic high school social scene," probably because she didn't instantly become Miss Popular. Not that it would be easy to find a guy who met her superior standards—intelligent, ambitious, good-looking, athletic, popular (but not shallow), socially conscientious, politically involved, nice car, good wardrobe, sophisticated taste in movies and music, avid reader ... Her list went on and on, plus she kept adding to it. Hannah had her standards, too, but they mostly revolved around a fuzzy combination of religious morality and touchy-feely stuff like vibes and kindness to trees and animals—oh, and good looks. Basically, she dated anyone with great dimples, lean muscle mass, and cool-looking hair who attended church more than twice a year and owned a shelter dog.

Several senior girls tottered across the stage in high heels. I was going to have to practice for hours to avoid making a total fool of myself next year. I could practically hear all of Lawlor erupting into big guffaws as I tripped down the steps. My diploma would roll down the aisle, but then Tyler Briggs would catch it. Our eyes would meet and he'd realize that I was the only girl he'd ever wanted. We'd go off to college together, graduate and come back and buy one of those big Caughlin Ranch mansions, and live happily ever after with our gorgeous little babies that looked like him and not me. On second thought, maybe I'd buy six-inch stilettos and
not
practice walking in them.

"Sleepy's coming up." Megan nudged me with her elbow. "Then we're leaving."

"Come on, we have to stay for the whole thing." Hannah pouted.

"Whatever." Megan sat back and searched her hair for split ends. She doesn't have any.

Everyone called Zane Zimmerman "Sleepy" because of the ZZ thing and because he had a tendency to fall asleep in class. Even his license plate said
SLEEPY Z
. (I used to love watching him rest his head on his arms in geometry. Once he winked at me before he closed his eyes.) From where we sat, Zane looked like a little black dot, except for a splash of white-blond hair glowing in the big overhead lights. People started yelling "Sleepy" even before the girl in front of him received her diploma. Several groups of students started fake snoring like they used to do at basketball games right before he'd shoot a free throw.

After shaking hands with the principal, Zane did three cartwheels across the stage. Then after one more not-short-enough speech about an Exciting New Journey into the Unknown, the whole senior class tossed their mortarboards into the air.

"Only one more dreadful, boring, immature year before we're free," Megan said.

After the ceremony we hung around to see if anything was going on, but the seniors were all headed up to a grad-night party at Tahoe, and even
we
weren't going to be caught dead at Matthew Doogan's video-game fest. I looked around for Tyler so I could say something not too stupid about us being seniors now, but I didn't see him anywhere. I hoped he wasn't going on some big family trip all summer. He was going to be the main ingredient in my Summer of Passion. At least, that was the plan.

"We need to celebrate," Hannah said. "We're seniors now."

"I don't want to stay out too late. I've got orientation tomorrow," Megan said.

"Oh, come on, Meggie." Hannah leaned her head on Megan's shoulder. "You can't turn into a high-powered attorney's summer-helper thingy yet. We're having our last free summer. Next year we'll all be heading off."

"
You'll
be heading off," I said. "I'll be heading to Truckee Meadows Community College to raise my grades." Staring at Zane for two years hadn't done much for my GPA. Neither had Tyler Tracking this past year; I kept getting hall passes to the bathroom so I could walk by his classes.

"Where's the positivity? We've got to do something. We're young, we're sexy, we're seventeen, we're new seniors." Hannah clapped her hands together. "Plus, tonight is day number one of my new midnight curfew. Yes, folks, the Johnstons have given their little girl a whole new half-hour of freedom."

"I'll do something involving nachos." Megan has a total junk food obsession, except she calls it "study munchies," like that makes it healthier or something.

"I'll do something involving boys." I swung my long hair from side to side. "I'm going to major in Boys 101 at TMCC."

Me and my future Nice Nose.

"You don't give yourself enough credit," Megan said. "You could get good grades if you'd focus. You could even get an internship if you'd simply figure out what you want to do with your life." I hated the way she liked to channel my mother.

I smirked. "FYI, I got a job."

"Doing what?"

I hesitated. All week I'd avoided the topic of jobs. Not that I wasn't excited about having a job and looking responsible and all that. I just wanted to postpone the inevitable teasing, especially after Dad's one-man comedy show:
Joy Ride Does Deliveries.
Very funny. Not.

I spoke fast. "I'm the new delivery person for Flowers and Cakes by Katie."

"Wait a minute. Your job involves
driving?
" Megan drew out the word
driving
longer than necessary.

"Is that a good idea? I mean, do they know about, you know—" Hannah paused.

"I can totally drive!" I put my hands on my hips. "Okay, I changed my mind. Forget nachos. Forget boys. Tonight I want to do something involving cars."

"You're not laying a finger on Bugsy," Megan said.

Megan's two great loves: her 4.0 GPA and the Volkswagen bug she had saved for since she was ten. She had even banned me from riding in Bugsy for a week after I spilled a Diet Coke during lunch last March. (Accidentally!)

"I've got it!" Hannah squealed. "We can do all three! This is going to be great."

Two hours and a platter of nachos later, we were sneaking up the walking path toward a certain desirable address on Long Knife Road, wearing jeans and black shirts and armed with whipped cream, mustard, ketchup, and chocolate sauce. Our shadows led the way in the moonlight. "What if a car comes?" I whispered.

"We'll hit the dirt." Hannah smacked her hands together, dropping a can of whipped cream and making a huge hey-notice-me echoing sound.

"Shh!" Megan hissed. Something rustled in the bushes along the side of the road.

"What if coyotes are stalking us?" I asked.

"Hello? We're in a fancy-schmancy housing development." Megan rolled her eyes at me; I could tell even though it was totally dark. I could
feel
it.

"People report coyote sightings all the time in the
Caughlin Rancher.
" We were one of the only neighborhoods in Reno with our own newspaper; people bragged about their fancy parties, newly decorated family rooms, job promotions, children's GPAs/athletic accomplishments/excesses of talent/ college admissions. And any wild-animal sightings. Great stuff. It was my mom's favorite reading material.

"Now that's pathetic." Megan walked ahead, muttering to herself as if to remind us—yet again—that this was
not
her idea. Reflections from a streetlamp shimmered in the man-made pond, and a pair of sleeping swans bobbed in the water.

"Car!" Hannah squealed. We slammed ourselves down on the paved path as headlights wound around the corner. The low-growing drought-resistant landscaping barely hid us. I inhaled the spicy scent of sagebrush as I pressed my arms against the still-warm asphalt.

"This is so juvenile," Megan said. "I'm going to regret this tomorrow when my alarm goes off at six-thirty."

I kind of recognized the
boom, boom
techno beat of LCD Soundsystem echoing down the street—so what if I'd started listening to the bands that Tyler advertised on his T-shirts? Maybe I could have a Tyler's-music passion or something. "It
is
him! Omigod!" I felt my cheeks glowing like a flashlight. "Could he see us? Did he see us?" I could totally read his personalized plate:
PLAYER 5
.

We lay on the pavement while the red taillights on Tyler's Jeep turned onto Long Knife Road. I prepared for Megan to launch into a speech that was a combination of how we were wasting her precious time and how Tyler Briggs was a spoiled rich boy who used people, especially girls. To top it off she'd repeat some anecdote from their shared AP English class—probably the one she'd heard about how Rachael Beal read
Rebecca
out loud to him while he lifted weights—to further prove his unworthiness. Hannah would counter with something about his cute smile and the nice vibe he gave off when he spoke up in their shared AP history class, but she'd agree with Megan about his "girl issues."

"That was close." Hannah giggled. "How long should we wait until we attack?"

"Maybe we should just forget about it." I sat up and brushed a bit of grit off my chest. "We're going to get caught."
Caughlin Rancher
headline: "Jory Michaels, Secret Stalker, Stopped."

"Yeah," Megan said. "He probably parks in a fifteen-car garage anyway."

"No, he parks in the driveway." I scrunched my eyes closed. And waited.

"Now, that's
truly
pathetic. I suppose you simply happen to jog all the way up here from your cozy little abode in The Cottages. Or maybe you lost the dog you don't even own. Or maybe you absolutely
had
to sell something as a fundraiser for a club you don't even belong to. Or—"

"Shut up, Megan. My mom walks up here all the time and sometimes I keep her company." I looked at Tyler's roof through the trees. "I can't help it if she's in love with Tyler's house." Tyler's dad paid for their humongous house by working as a big executive-CEO-president of something or other at the Atlantis Casino.

"How romantic," Hannah said. "You could totally marry Tyler, and your mom could live with you, and her dream of living in that house would come true."

I pictured waking up next to Tyler. Nice. But then Mom would be in the kitchen making meat loaf for breakfast. "That's sick."

"That's what I've been trying to tell you," Megan said. "You're sick. I don't get your Tyler obsession. He's pretty immature."

"Like you would know."

"Let's count." Megan held out her hand and put down her fingers one at a time. "I had three classes with him and you had—hmm?"

"One."

"And it was PE," Hannah said, as if I didn't know.

The last thing I wanted to think about was being the slowest one around the jogging track, whiffing the softball, scoring a goal for the opposing team in soccer, and getting hit in the head with a volleyball. No wonder Tyler never asked me out. Plus, the coach made me wear my long hair tied back so I was
all
nose. Super Schnozz! Able to humiliate herself during any sport.

"Quiet, quiet." Hannah walked up toward Tyler's house.

Tyler had parked his Jeep at an angle across one of the driveways of his six-car garage. Hannah made yellow-mustard smiley faces that showed up really nice against the forest green paint, while Megan drew ketchup hearts with chocolate sauce arrows across the windshield. I was supposed to write
RHS Seniors Rule!
with whipped cream on the windows. I sprayed
Seniors
across the back and
Rule
on the passenger window.

"Duck," Hannah whispered as a light went on in the house. So that's where Tyler slept. Second floor, above garage number three. I watched his shadow pull his shirt over his head.
Omigod! What if he sees me?
I started breathing fast as my heart thump-bumped wildly. Would he be totally mad? Or totally flattered?

"He's naked!" Hannah squeal-whispered. Her mouth bunched up like she was trying to hold in giggles.

"I do not need to see this." Megan choked on a laugh. "Jory, hurry up with the whipped cream already."

I put my foot out as if to flee down his dark driveway, but I couldn't take my eyes off the shadowy figure in the window. All that après-ski-season weightlifting.